17 June 2014

AFC U-16 Women's Championship 2015 - qualifiers

Kuala Lumpur: Twenty-one nations have known their opponents in the upcoming qualifiers for the AFC U-16 Women’s Championship 2015 after an official draw at AFC House on Tuesday.

The top four teams of the AFC U-16 Women’s Championship China 2013 -- Japan, DPR Korea, China PR and Thailand -- were removed from the qualifiers and received a direct qualification for the finals.

The remaining 21 teams -- 12 from West and South/Central Asia and nine from East Asia and ASEAN -- were divided into two zones, East and West zones, during the draw with seeding based on the rankings of the 2013 edition.

The West zone consists of Group A and Group B with the former group comprising Sri Lanka, Uzbekistan, Bahrain, Palestine, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. The latter group has Bangladesh, Iran, Jordan, India, the UAE and Qatar.

The East zone also has two groups, with Group C being the hotspot for Australia, Korea Republic, Hong Kong, the Northern Mariana Islands and Vietnam.

Chinese Taipei, Myanmar, the Philippines and Cambodia make up Group D.

Each group shall play a one-round league in a centralised venue, where each team in the group shall play one match against every other team. The winners from each group (total four teams) will qualify for the eight-nation finals.